Sector 7. Flashes of red and blue lights bled through the dark corners of Justice Square, above the crossed lines of yellow police tape that swayed beneath a gust of wind. A quiet prelude to the rain and storm that descended - slowly at first, then all at once - upon the blood-carved message at the centre. “The tents, Sergeant! Get me the tents!” The Templar forensic shouted, sending men and women in white-grey fatigues scrambling to preserve the crime scene. The city came alight in the reflections of the drenched streets, blurred through the ripples into beams of lights and colours. A Cazador crept on a high rooftop, far away from the lights of the Templars or the hovering of ARES’s security helicopters. It slinked with a low, canine gait behind several rows of spiralling exhausts, its red-eyes whirring as it zoomed into the tents. Its screen flashed through different vision modes, until “DIE ARES” came alight in sprays of neon blue.

[i]Thunk.[/i] A jostle of cloth and chimes dropped beside the unit. A girl squatted on the very edge of the skyscraper in a hoodie and a schoolgirl skirt and pulled headphones down around her neck. Water dripped from her soaking hood. [color=#bb533b][b]"Hey doggie,"[/b][/color] she said and went to pat its head, [color=#bb533b][b]"What're you supposed to be? You don't look like you've got a suit for a master."[/b][/color]

The Cazador stood with its front legs apart and its hinds close together, its front side hunkered low. [i]A GIRL.[/i] Its optics scanned her features for recognition. Police database, no match. Templar roster, no match. It relaxed its posture and leaned slightly forward in a wordless demand for more pets. [b]”Dober-unit K695,”[/b] it replied, emulating the monotone drone of a lesser unit. [b]”Sector-7 cleanup and reconnaissance unit. Grant affection and move along, citizen.”[/b] 

[i][color=#bb533b][b]“Blahdyadada,”[/b][/color][/i] the girl exclaimed to the sky and blew a raspberry. [color=#bb533b][b]“Don’t talk corpo to me. I know what you are.”[/b][/color] She scratched the robot under its chin, between the menacing fangs, an action which swiftly accelerated to rough-housing. [color=#bb533b][b]“A good boy! Such a good boy! Yes you are, [i]yes you are!”[/i][/b][/color] The play stopped abruptly. She smiled down at the Cazador, its head happily nestled between her hands - and pulled.

A red eye glinted from a gap in the kid’s coffin backpack, surveying the crowds she skipped through on the ground. She jumped and snatched a cap from a cop, disappearing from view the second he tossed around and shouted. A notebook and pen was pilfered from another's belt. She bounced through mostly unnoticed for someone whose clothes were so loud, until she was skidding through a puddle, right beside a certain zappy Templar.

[color=#bb533b][b]"AHEM,"[/b][/color] she conjured up her manliest cough, dipped the cop hat on her head, and tapped her notebook. [color=#bb533b][b]"So what's the theory, Officer Templar?"[/b][/color] She asked gruffly and shook her head, looking over the chaos with the jaded eyes of a bloke two days out from his retirement. [color=#bb533b][b]"Where's the sick son of a bitch that did this?"[/b][/color]